When Grace learned she'd be going to a camp with her friends, she was thrilled. Every girl around her age in her southern Malawi village would attend the rite of passage, known as an initiation camp. They counted down to what seemed like summer camp.

If you're walking along the east African coast and chance upon a herd of brightly-striped elephants, flame-hued rhinos and a tower of crazily-colored giraffes, then don't panic, you're not hallucinating -- and neither have you stumbled on a psychedelic new species, sorry.